While cleaning up the bookshop, Ken unearths a creepy little piece of Cold War-era ephemera: a $.05 pamphlet entitled Should an A-Bomb Fall. Published by the Offices of Civil Defense in 1951, it's full of advice for surviving a nuclear explosion such as, “Go under your desk,” “Don’t look directly at the explosion,” and, “If you are at least 18 blocks away you’ll be completely fine.” These hints seem distinctly unhelpful to us today, and may lead us to suspect that the primary purpose of this pamphlet was not to save lives but to reassure the American public that a nuclear war with Russia wouldn’t have been the end of the world. We’ll talk about this and other cultural expressions of Cold War anxieties on today’s episode.
Brattlecast #78 - The Brattle and the City
A radio interview with Lizabeth Cohen, author of the new book, Saving America’s Cities: Ed Logue and the Struggle to Renew Urban America in the Suburban Age, reminds Ken of the Brattle’s own struggle with urban renewal. Logue was head of the Boston Redevelopment Agency when, in the 1960’s, the city demolished most of Scollay Square, a vibrant but increasingly seedy entertainment district - and original home of the Brattle Book Shop. Most of the area was replaced with the I.M. Pei designed Government Center, a monumental plaza of modernist buildings which many consider cold and alienating. Although Ken’s father, George Gloss, together with the Boston Athenaeum, raised enough of an outcry to save a few historic buildings from the wrecking ball, the Brattle itself was displaced. It would be the first of seven moves for the plucky book shop, one of which was occasioned by a catastrophic fire, but the Brattle endured, with a great deal of personality and help from the community; eventually landing in the West Street location where it thrives today.